Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>]

On 24/08/2003 19:53, Kaz wrote:

> Peter Kirk wrote:
>
>  
>
> > On 24/08/2003 01:23, furuli AT online.no wrote:
> >
> >    
> >
> > > 2. A word dos have meaning apart from a context. If we asked a  group
> > > of people how they would understand the  English word "soul," we would
> > > get a whole range of different comments, but probably we would find
> > > some elements which were common to most, or all comments.
> > >      
> > I doubt it, unless you can find some common semantic element between the
> > Greek concept of an immortal part of the human being and a style of
> > music. The word "soul" with no context will trigger one meaning for some
> > English speakers and the other for some others.
> >    
>
> Of course, any modern reader who thinks that the OT would be discussing a
> 20th Century form of music when reading the word "soul" in the Bible, cannot
> be viewed as typical in reference to students of Scripture.  People with
> special learning needs deserve consideration, but I doubt that it is
> necessary to "dumb down" the Bible to accommodate those who don't know the
> difference between soul as a form of music and soul as a biblical concept.
>  
Indeed. That's because the word "soul" is not being used out of context 
in the Bible. It is being used as part of a regular set of usages in a 
context, in accordance with what Jim West and others wrote about words 
being "meaningless without specific textual contexts".

On the other hand, many modern readers of the OT will tend to understand 
"soul" even in the biblical context in terms of a half-understood Greek 
concept of the immaterial and immortal part of the human. That is 
probably inappopriate for the Hebrew NEPE$, which is where we started 
this thread.

>  
>
> > > There are Bible translations that consistently render NEPE$ by "soul,"
> > > and by looking up these passages, one can see that this is meaningful
> > > - although it requires more mental exercise from the reader, because
> > > he or she must do more interpretations - than when the word is
> > > interpreted by the translators.
> > >      
> > The trouble with this is that, even if we use accept  your model, there
> > is minimal overlap between the fuzzy Hebrew concept of NEPE$ and average
> > English speakers' even more fuzzy concept of soul.
> >    
>
> Here you have a very good point, for the average modern English speaking
> person has had his concept of "soul" tainted by centuries of extra-biblical
> teaching that is based more on Platonic dualism than anything else.
> However, this is, in fact, a compelling reason for accepting Rolf's model of
> translation, for his model allows Bible students to decide for themselves
> whether ancient Jewish beliefs were a foregleam of Plato, or not.
Well, a few people will be capable of and motivated for study in 
sufficient depth to decide this for themselves, but most will tend to 
rely on their own understanding of the word in context, which is 
probably misleading. I think it would have been better to transliterate 
"nephesh" in an English text rather than use "soul", because that would 
force users to do their own research or refer to study notes rather than 
to insert their own probably inappropriate understanding of the word.

Another interesting point on "Dead Souls": this is the English version 
of the title of Gogol's novel in Russian (1842). Although Gogol's title 
is does not correspond to the current Russian Synodal translation (1876) 
in Leviticus 21:11, it would correspond to a literal translation as 
might have been in use in Gogol's time, and so might have been a 
deliberate allusion. The title is an oxymoron in Russian, even more than 
in English, as a soul is almost by definition something living. And the 
title seems to be a word play: the "dead souls" were both the deceased 
serfs who were being traded as a scam and the souls in the very Russian 
sense of morality and culture of those involved in the trade. (Well, 
that's a second hand summary, I haven't read the book!)

--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/